Faye Dunaway had previously refused a guest role on the show. As a revenge, the writers stuck her in a goofy film that would be considered underneath her calibre of work (that Homer tried to see) called Honk If You're Horny! with Pauly Shore.
The writers were also discussing about how they were going to treat Homer's obesity. They did not want Homer to come off as a "hog", so they decided that the viewer should barely see him eating after he reaches his 300 pounds goal.
After Homer reached his target weight of 300 pounds, he went to shop for new, larger clothes at a store called The Vast Waistband. This refers to a speech delivered on 9 May 1961 by then-FCC chair Newton Minow, in which he said that "When television is good, nothing... is better. But when television is bad, nothing is worse." He then described overall TV content as "...a vast wasteland." The phrase "vast wasteland" has been used ever since to criticize television programming.
The drinking bird Homer has "cover for him" was a gift from Herb in Brother, Can You Spare Two Dimes? (1992)
While Homer is in the clothes store, two mannequins wearing similar outfits and riding on bikes are shown. These are based on Billy and Benny McCrary, the world's heaviest twins who weighed over 700 pounds (318 kg) each. They received fame after appearing in The Guinness Book of World Records in a picture that depicts the twins riding their Honda motorcycles. They would appear again in the same season in The Day the Violence Died (1996).